In Awe of a Butterfly
by Tori101
Summary: “The sky…can’t keep you from falling back down, huh?” Vaan murmurs, and Balthier knows it's not about the butterfly anymore. "It does not hold you," he says. “It guides you,” he murmurs, knowing that he had waited long enough. Implied BalVaa One-shot.


**In Awe of a Butterfly**

_Disclaimer_: Final Fantasy XII does not belong to me.

Balthier watches Vaan staring off into the wood, eyes wide and searching, hands limp at his sides.

Fran stands away from them, her arms crossed and eyes closed, because she does not want to stare at what she cannot touch. Penelo speaks with the Princess because Vaan isn't talking and Ashe wanted someone to listen, and Basch is trapped between them.

The moogles care little for the party's worries and are only too happy to accept the coins from the man who is even bothering with the purchase of supplies because Vaan would sooner slip something into his pocket with those sticky fingers and Penelo would be too giving to the sweet, furry creatures in charming clothes.

Echoes of distant creatures surround them, and Vaan is stepping too close to the edge of the path, staring down at the ground that can't be seen from their height. The trees are too tall.

Sunlight breaks through the treetops, and leaves flutter faintly and delicately as they fall, seemingly forever, into the green abyss below. Vaan has never seen so much green, unless he was staring into one sky pirate's eyes, but that is another thing entirely, and the street rat's throat is dry. A glimmer catches the corner of his eye, and he's running.

The others call after him and he does not care. His legs carry him over the precarious bridges and he is in Eruyt and Viera turn their pretentious faces towards him in displeasure as his apparent existence disrupts their own. But again, he does not care, and is only interested in the glimmer of light he'd seen.

When Balthier finds him, the boy is sitting on the edge of a bridge, leaning against a screen and scrutinizing something in his hand. The pirate says nothing but there is relief and annoyance in his eyes.

Vaan peers up at him with accusing eyes, and the man doesn't know what to say.

In the boy's palm is a butterfly, but it is no longer living.

--

Penelo races beside Vaan as they splash knee-deep in the breakers of Phon Coast. The Hunter's Camp is not far, but Ashe complained of constantly flying off to settle someone's petition and her boots were causing her ache.

Basch said nothing to her and hid his own hands from view, calloused from the hilt of his sword. Fran had given them both a look that no one was quite sure what it meant, but she had then retreated with her bow to gaze lazily at the sea from atop a hill, Balthier going with her. It was Vaan who had slung a dark look at the princess, for there was an itching in his fingers that told him he hadn't felt enough of the burning pain.

Now they rested, with nothing but the sounds of waves gurgling and palm trees fluttering in the breezes.

Twilight fell upon them with a great, fiery sunset and the two orphans were taken by it. Vaan looks out over the ocean, past the beautiful finned creatures that sprang up from it, and off into the sky. His footsteps backwards slosh in the water, and Penelo stares at him with a quiet look on her face.

He is staring at the sky and she can only remember home.

Balthier watches the two with bored interest, his green gaze distant and his lips pursed tightly.

"You are thinking too hard," Fran murmurs, a content look on her face in place of a smile as an ocean-scented breeze bursts by, caressing her dark cheeks.

"I don't believe I have the slightest clue as to what you're talking about," the man quips back, his mouth now a grin, but his eyes still trapped by platinum tresses and desert skin.

"Just because it flies does not mean the only way is freedom or capture," the Viera says cryptically, standing up with her bow.

"Now you're just playing with me," he says, but before another word can leave his lips, Fran lifts her hand to the breeze, and small thing alights on her finger.

It is a butterfly, small and delicate, but lucky enough to brave the ocean winds and survive. It flutters its wings and jumps back into the air at the last second, before a sharp gust sends it high up towards the sky.

"One waits forever, one waits moments," the Viera says, drawing her bow and an arrow which she aims perfectly. Balthier knows she can hit it, Fran knows she can strike it. But at the last moment, she closes her eyes and relaxes the bowstring, dropping the weapon to her side.

Crimson eyes sparkle and for a moment she stares at the pirate with an impassive face, an ear twitches. "One doesn't wait," she says, almost urgently, "and one misses it."

Balthier still watches the children on the beach, and as the wind currents bring the butterfly down to them, Vaan stares at it wonderingly. He reaches for it with no hesitation, and it evades his fingers. Penelo follows him when the boy races after the fluttering thing, both of them tripping in the sand and the water and laughing.

"He did not wait." Fran murmurs, a small smile on her lips as she elegantly turns away.

Balthier stands, jumping from the small cliff edge to the beach, a swift pursuit pushing him forward.

--

The Strahl is quiet, save for the humming of Her engines deep within.

Vaan is in the bridge, the only light coming from the controls and switches that glow in an array of colors that reflect confusingly off of the orphan's skin.

With shaking hands, his fingers ghost over the controls he'd watched Balthier pressing expertly earlier that day. He exhales quietly, and murmurs with a whispery voice the names of the switches and buttons, furrowing his brow when he can't remember.

He is surprised and jumps when Balthier speaks up from the doorway, placing a name to a particular control Vaan failed to recall.

The sky pirate says nothing more and stalks towards Vaan, his green eyes lit oddly by the glowing motherboard. Vaan finds himself with his back to the controls, and his eyes are staring straight into Balthier's. But the pirate glances behind the boy, gives a curt not, and leans against his own seat, patting it.

"Go on," he says.

Vaan stares at him, approaching slowly, expecting it to be a joke. But it is not a joke, and soon Vaan is sitting in that chair, and his hands are at the controls, and he is steering the Strahl.

Balthier's fingers are over his, guiding his movements, and the pirate's lips are at his ear, murmuring quiet instructions.

The two have no more to say, till dawn rises on the horizon and both know neither of them is going to sleep.

"Where do butterflies sleep?" Vaan wonders aloud.

The man's palms brush against the boy's knuckles, and Balthier admits that he does not know.

"Perhaps where they land," he offers.

Vaan shakes his head.

"If I could fly," he says, gripping the controls tighter, his chin trembling and the muscles in his throat tense, "I'd never want to land."

The sky pirate says nothing more as he allows Vaan to stare off into the sky that he is able to steer the Strahl through as if he did have wings. And Balthier stares with him, his eyes following the boy's, and his hands guiding Vaan's.

--

Vaan peers up at him with accusing eyes, and the man doesn't know what to say.

In the boy's palm is a butterfly, but it is no longer living.

"What do you want me to do about it?" Balthier asks, gazing at the street rat with his intense green stare.

The boy has no words, and looks to the poor creature with honest sadness in his eyes. Glancing to the abyss below them, Balthier watches Vaan as the boy brings his hand out over the bridge, and slowly tilts his arm till the butterfly is falling from his palm slowly and delicately.

Even in death, it appears to be flying as it falls lower and lower, tilting and fluttering but still falling, falling…And the thief watches it until his sandstorm eyes can no longer do so.

"The sky…can't keep you from falling back down, huh?" the boy murmurs quietly, lips shaking.

_And Balthier knows it isn't about the butterfly anymore._

The pirate approaches the boy carefully; not at all frightened by the immense height they're standing at on the bridge. His hand reaches out and rests atop Vaan's head. Calloused but gentle fingers sift through the pale, pale hair, and Balthier can't help but sigh.

"It doesn't hold you," he says, and Vaan looks up at him, causing the man's fingers to fall to the boy's cheek.

Fingertips trace the desert-born skin and fall to wind-chapped lips. Green eyes stare into a pale sandstorm and are helplessly trapped.

The pirate kneels, and his fingers are still touching Vaan's face and tilting his head to look upwards, towards breaks in the tree tops, towards the sky.

Balthier's lips are at his ear, and the sky pirate is still for a moment.

"It guides you," he murmurs, knowing that he had waited long enough.

_Fin_


End file.
